


Timing is Anything (Episode 1)

by JB Harris (LizAna)



Series: The Timeless Chronicles [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Torchwood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Doctor Who Fusion, Angst and Feels, Children of Earth Fix-It, Crossover, Female Doctor (Doctor Who), M/M, POV The Doctor (Doctor Who), Torchwood References, janto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-23
Updated: 2017-12-06
Packaged: 2019-02-06 02:49:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 21,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12807999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LizAna/pseuds/JB%20Harris
Summary: The 13th Doctor knows something is emerging from the dark edges of the universe. Something ancient. Something unrelenting. And saving Ianto Jones may be the only way to stop it. (A series in which The Doctor saves Ianto from dying in CoE and he becomes the 13th Doctor's companion but NO Ianto/Doctor pairing - All Janto angst)





	1. Chapter One

London 2009

Timing. Funny word, timing, considering time and space were more like a big ball of tangled yarn, rather than the straight line people tended to think it.

But in this case, the timing had to be just right. Too early, and certain people who needed to be avoided would still be in the way. Too late, and he'd be really dead. No chance of saving him.

And Ianto Jones really needed saving.

The Doctor aimed to land the TARDIS in a janitorial closet of the high school where dozens of bodies had been laid out under red sheets in the gymnasium. But of course, when she opened the door and stepped out, she nearly tripped over a cello.

Music room. Right, not as inconspicuous as a closet, but as long as she had the timing right, then the rest was all semantics.

Letting the door of the TARDIS swing closed behind her, she paused to listen as voices echoed from the corridor. Male, talking in short, sharp sentences. Probably the military or UNIT. No one she wanted to run into when she didn't want anyone to know she was here. If they knew The Doctor was in town, they'd expect her to do something about the alien-children situation, and Torchwood already had that well in hand, even if they didn't realize it yet.

Ianto's death was the catalyst for Torchwood's leader, Captain Jack Harkness, to finally work out how to stop the alien threat the humans were calling the 456. This was one of those pesky fixed-point-in-time situations where The Doctor couldn't, shouldn't interfere.

Right now, Jack was devastated about losing the man he loved, almost broken. Almost. But not quite. Because now he was also desperate and angry. And while the 456—who were actually a parasitic, low-life race of gas-breathing creatures called the Sohanidd—hadn't worked it out yet, thinking they'd claimed victory and the ten percent of the world's children they were demanding, killing Ianto had been the one thing they could do to guarantee Jack would find a way to beat them once and for all. No matter the cost. Because that cost… Oh, that cost was too much. But the only way Jack would follow through was if he already felt like he had nothing left to lose.

So, no, she didn't need anyone to find her here and get her involved, because then Jack would look to her for answers, and it could change the outcome. There was only one outcome she was here to change, and that was the finality of Ianto's death. She'd seen patterns developing, things that made her decide she needed to take a gamble and change the course of Ianto's fate.

He was meant to die today; an entire timeline had unfolded with just that eventuality. But something was happening in the dark corners of the galaxy, something she didn't understand yet, and her instincts were shouting at her not to ignore it. So, even knowing it could actually make things worse, she was going to change history and save Ianto's life, while hopefully still keeping the balance of events that had to occur today.

Once the voices had faded away, she crossed the room and peeked into the corridor to check it was clear before slipping out. She let the sound of muffled voices lead her to the gymnasium, pausing to look through a small square window in one of the two double swinging doors. She had to stand on tip-toes to see. Damn short legs. Most of her last regenerations, she'd been tall. Of course, she'd also been a man. So there was that.

In the middle of the gym, Jack sat with an arm around Gwen Cooper, the other surviving member of Torchwood. The only surviving member of Torchwood. Apart from Jack who couldn't die, the rest had all perished in one way or another. But every single one of them had given their lives to save the planet from destruction at different points in time.

Jack and Gwen were staring down at Ianto, neither of them looking like they planned to move anytime soon.

"Come on, Jack. Say your goodbyes and be on your way. Before it's too late," she mumbled to herself.

"Can I help you, Miss?" A pair of soldiers had walked up behind her while she'd been distracted looking through the door glass. Every now and then, she still looked over her shoulder to find the Miss people were referring to, until she remembered that she was the Miss. Or ma'am. Or hey lady depending on what she was doing that day.

"Oh, no, I'm fine." She sent them what she hoped was a friendly, not-up-to-anything smile. "Just waiting for someone."

The soldiers nodded and then continued through to the gym, chatting to each other.

Once the doors swung closed again, she went back on tip-toes to steal another look. Jack and Gwen were finally on their feet, still with their arms around one another, walking slowly, stiffly away from the body. Though Jack was aging immeasurably slower than a normal human—he still had thousands of years to live—he looked so much older than the last time she'd seen him, as if losing Ianto had stolen hundreds of years off that vast lifetime of his.

If only she could tell him he would see Ianto again. But that was for another day. For today, Jack needed to keep on believing that Ianto was gone forever.

By the time Jack and Gwen had disappeared from sight, she was practically hopping on the spot with impatience. The window of time she had to revive Ianto was rapidly shrinking. The pair had barely left the gym through the outside doors before she went rushing out. If they came back, she was banking on the fact that Jack wouldn't recognize her—at least not right away. Last time Jack had seen The Doctor, he'd had brown hair. Among other more noticeable changes.

It was getting late in the evening and people were gradually leaving, plus with the alien threat still hanging over them, no one was worrying too much about the already-dead when there were millions of children who needed saving. No one paid her any attention as she crossed the rows of bodies, but she kept her head ducked just in case, doing her best not to attract attention to herself. Jack and Gwen had left the red sheet off Ianto's face, as if they couldn't bear to fully cover him like the rest of the bodies.

He certainly looked dead as a doornail. She hoped she wasn't wrong about this. His lips were blue and his skin was grey. She pulled her sonic screwdriver out of her pocket and gave him a quick scan before checking the reading. Ah-ha. Just what she'd been hoping to find. He wasn't dead yet. Just in a very, very deep sleep. Exactly like sleeping beauty.

Ianto Jones, however, was much prettier than sleeping beauty. And unfortunately, true love's kiss wasn't the cure to this disease.

Actually, if the virus was what she suspected, it really was the same thing sleeping beauty had caught. Not the Disney version. The real-life sleeping beauty the story was based on. A German princess from around the mid-17th century who'd eaten what she'd thought was an apple, but had actually been a piece of contaminated fruit thrown out of a passing tourist spaceship. Gosh, had that been a doozer of a day. The king nearly had her drawn and quartered before she'd worked out what was wrong with his daughter.

The secondary analysis on the sonic screwdriver finished with a whirr and confirmed the diagnosis. She slipped the device away again and then reached into a different pocket, pulling out several small vials and sorting through them to find the neon purple one with the anti-viral to counteract the effects. Tasted like death, but was preferable to actual death.

"Down the hatch, Ianto Jones." She pinched his chin to part his lips, glancing around to make sure no one was watching before she tipped the contents of the vial into his mouth. The room was now empty, apart from the two soldiers who'd spoken to her out in the corridor. And the dead.

The truth was, none of these people were actually dead. Oh, they would be within ten to twenty minutes. And she would have saved every one of them if she could. But she didn't have enough anti-viral to go around, and while she didn't want to say Ianto was any more important than anyone else here—their lives cut tragically short when the 456 aliens had released the fast and deadly virus into Thames House—the fact was, she needed Ianto alive. The entire universe possibly needed Ianto alive. She just hadn't worked out why yet.

Ianto gasped suddenly, his eyes snapping open, gaze frantic as he looked around. She set her hands on his shoulders to stop him from getting up right away.

"Jack—Jack. We have to stop them—"

"Calm down, Mr. Jones. Just take a minute to get your breath back." She glanced over her shoulder, but so far, Ianto's miraculous resurrection had gone unnoticed by the two guards sitting at the very far end of the gym.

He focused on her, blue eyes impossibly bright.

"Who are you?"

"I'm The Doctor. And you, Mr. Jones, need to come with me."

"The Doctor?" Ianto pulled out of her grasp, confusion in his features. "The Doctor. Jack told me about you. He said you had something to do with it, why he can't die. He said you helped him. He said—he said you were a man."

She wrapped her arm around his shoulders, urging him up so they could make their getaway before the two guards finally noticed something was going on.

"Yes, I was a man. Now I'm a woman. Things change. Bodies regenerate. Now are you coming with me, or not?"

He did his best to get on his feet, still weak, swaying slightly against her.

"What happened to me?"

"You were sick, I made you better." She got a firm arm around him to help keep him upright and led him away from his place among the dead.

"Where are we going?"

"Away from here for a start." They skirted the bodies, and Ianto paused as he suddenly seemed to realize where they were.

"All these people, they're all dead." He swayed again and she tightened her hold on him, snatching another glance at the soldiers.

"We can't help them now. But if you want to help everyone else, then you need to come with me."

"They're dead because of us. Because we went in there and told them we weren't going to give them the children." They started moving again, but it wasn't much more than a slow shuffle.

"You did the right thing, Ianto. It might not seem like it now, but you did the right thing."

"Where's Jack? Is he under one of these sheets? I don't want him to be alone when he wakes up." He paused again, casting a searching glance, like he was thinking about going back to search the bodies until he found Jack.

"Jack is gone. I'll explain everything—"

"Gone?" Ianto pulled out of her hold, managing to stay upright, seeming a bit stronger now. "What do you mean Jack's gone? He wouldn't have left me. Not unless—"

The dawning realization on his face was heartbreaking. On both her hearts.

Ianto gasped a breath like he was in physical pain. "I have to go find him. He thinks I'm dead, doesn't he?"

She held out her hands, trying to keep him calm. "Ianto, I know this doesn't make any sense right now, but you can't see Jack. He needs to think you're dead. It's the only way he'll do what needs to be done."

"That's ballocks." Ianto's voice went up by twenty or so decibels, his blue eyes wet with unshed tears. "How can it be better to let him think I'm dead?"

The shouting finally got the attention of the two guards, who were looking like they were going to come over and intervene.

"Please, I'll explain everything. I'll take you to see Jack. But can we get out of here first?"

"Hey! You two!" One of the guards yelled out suddenly.

"Ianto, are you feeling any better yet?" she asked, watching the two guards dance around the bodies as they tried to hurry toward them.

He sniffed, wiping a hand over his face. "No, actually. I feel like microwaved death."

"Then I'm sorry for this, but, run!"

She grabbed his arm and yanked him into action. They sprinted the remaining distance across the open floor of the gym and slammed through the doors into the corridor. Almost right away, Ianto pulled to a stop, gasping for air and bending over to brace his hands on his knees.

"I can't— Need a second. Can't run anymore."

She yanked her sonic screwdriver out and locked the doors, scrambling the tumblers so even the key wouldn't work. It'd give them a few extra minutes until the guards either broke the door or found another way around.

She took Ianto's arm and helped him straighten. "Come on. No more running for now. I promise."

No, they weren't running, but she did hustle him into a very fast walk. By the time they reached the music room, he was practically stumbling, coughing over every breath. Just inside the familiar blue doors of the TARDIS, she finally let him go. While he sunk down on the floor to catch his breath, she rushed over to the console and fired up the engines.

She circled around, pushing buttons, turning knobs and throwing levers until the TARDIS breathed into life.

"Where are we?" Ianto used the railing to pull himself to his feet.

"The TARDIS. My ship. I assume Jack told you all about that as well."

Ianto took a few slow steps forward, looking around. "He might have mentioned it."

"Well?" She spun to face him and held out her arms.

"Well what?" He coughed again, pressing a hand against his chest with a grimace.

"You didn't say the thing. Everyone has to say the thing the first time."

"I'm sorry, what thing?"

She went over and took his hand, leading him around the console and sitting him down in the seat, dropping down next to him.

"It's bigger on the inside. Although, once someone told me it was smaller on the outside. Clever, impossible girl. Not so good with words."

Ianto stared at her, blinking, his brow furrowed like he was having trouble keeping up.

"About Jack—"

She huffed as she pushed to her feet. "What is people's obsession with Jack Harkness? Those 51st century pheromones aren't that great, I've smelled better. He's a good kisser, I'll give you that. But really, is he worth all the trouble that follows him around?"

"It's not an obsession." Ianto's features tightened with anger. "I love him. And right now, he needs me. I don't care what you say, letting him believe I'm dead can't possibly be the best thing for anyone."

She leaned against the console and crossed her arms. "I told you I'd take you to see him, and I will. But there's something I need to show you first."

"Something you need to show me?" He got to his feet, fists clenched. "We don't have time for sight-seeing. The whole world—all those children. They're in danger right now."

"And they'll always be in trouble right now, because it's a fixed point in time I have no interest in messing up."

Ianto's brow creased, clearly trying to figure out what she was telling him.

"The TARDIS can go anywhere in space and time. Which means we can spare an hour or two to see a few things, and then I can drop you right back where you were, two minutes after we left. You won't miss anything. Jack will still be there, I promise."

"Then take me back now. I don't want to see anything, I need to help Jack and Gwen."

The TARDIS gave a familiar whooshing-wheezing noise before powering down.

"But we're here, Mr Jones. And believe me, this is something you want to see." She pushed away from the console and held out her hand.

"But he thinks I'm dead. I can't even imagine how much that's hurting him." Ianto coughed, breath getting short, the after effects of the virus still playing havoc on his body.

She walked by him and went to find a glass of water. But then she got waylaid digging him up a bowler hat and pair of glasses. He was definitely going to need a disguise.

She returned a moment later to hand over the water. "Didn't I just get through explaining the whole TARDIS time and space thing? We won't let Jack think you're dead any longer than we have to, okay?"

Just long enough to make sure he saved the little speck on the edge of the universe called Earth and all it's amazing, infuriating inhabitants.

Ianto drank down every last drop of water in the glass and then exhaled a long breath.

"Fine, I'll go see whatever it is you want me to see if it'll get me back to Torchwood quicker."

"Now we're in business. Put these on."

She plonked the hat on his head and held out the wide, square-rimmed glasses.

"What do I need these for?" He took the hat off, but she slipped it from his hand and put it right back on again.

"Don't worry, you look charming. Bowler hats are cool. And it's because we're going incognito."

He actually looked her up and down. "I don't see you wearing any disguise."

"This entire regeneration is a disguise, believe me."

Grabbing his arm, she tugged him into motion, but he paused to set the empty glass on the nearest horizontal surface.

"Not on the control console, you heathen." She grabbed the glass and tossed it over the railing. A second later it broke on the lower level in a tinkle of shards. She pulled him into motion as he gaped over his shoulder at where the glass had disappeared. "Don't worry, the TARDIS will take care of that. But we don't leave things on the console. I have rules now, you see. Ever since Amelia Pond left a half-eaten chocolate bar on there and it melted into the primary rift matrix. We got lost in this one binary system for weeks. It was not as fun as it sounds. I'm still finding little sticky bits of cocoa and sugar in places those substances should never go."

"Right, no leaving things on the console," Ianto replied, sounding a little overwhelmed.

They stepped through the doors of the TARDIS, out into the orange light of a red dwarf star. They'd landed at the edge of a bustling city square. On one side was a funky little craft market selling handmade gifts and collectables. Another side held a transport hub where people were coming and going from mono-rail-like shuttles. Over further, some kind of rally seemed to be happening.

"Where are we?" Ianto seemed positively dazed now.

"A little planet circling a little red star, seven-hundred-thousand light years from Earth and approximately… oh, five hundred years in the future."

He looked this way and that, as if he didn't know what to take in first. "These people, they're all—"

"Human. You lot eventually colonize one end of the universe to the other, like adorable little rodents."

He cut her a lightly indignant look, but didn't reply.

"Anyway, we didn't come here just to see some boring city."

"Boring? On a planet five-hundred-years in the future, a gazillion light years from home?" Ianto shook his head. "This is so—"

Apparently, he didn't have words for exactly what he thought it was.

"Amazing?" she supplied. She'd travelled so far and for so long, she often forgot to take in the wonder of the things she saw. That's why she needed them. Companions. Friends picked up along the way. Through them, she remembered to get a little star-struck and appreciate the moments day-to-day. "Spectacular. The most astounding, breathless moment of your previously tiny existence."

"I was going to say normal." This time when he looked around, it was like he'd finally got everything together in his head, shaken off the last cobwebs of the virus that'd nearly killed him. He was still a little pale, but all things considered, it could have been worse. "It's just people, and it all looks so normal."

"Oh." Ianto Jones was not like regular people. He said the unexpected. She liked it, and she was beginning to see why the enigmatic Captain Jack Harkness had fallen so hard for the charming Welshman. "Well then, let's see if we can find something not-normal to surprise that single heart of yours."

The look he gave her in return suggested Jack probably hadn't told him about the two-hearts thing, which no doubt made that last statement sound completely odd. Most people found the things she said completely odd at one time or another. But it just made things all the more fun.

She led Ianto across the city square, down a busy block and into a little building nestled between two taller structures. When they walked in, the scent of incense enveloped them. A special incense of mind-altering properties, if breathed for too long. They wouldn't be able to spend too long in here with that incense seeping into every pore, or anything could happen.

Soft low music was coming from somewhere, while hushed, relaxed-sounding voices chatted and laughed without disturbing the peace.

"What is this place, some kind of temple?" Ianto asked in a loud whisper.

"Something like that."

They came to a wooden door and she pushed it open, waving an arm to indicate he should go first. He spent a long second looking at her, before stepping through.

She followed after him, but unsurprisingly, he'd pulled to a halt just inside.

"What the hell is going on here?" His voice was tight, gaze fixed straight ahead like he couldn't believe what he was seeing. She studied his expression, since she'd already studied everything in this room for clues.

"I was hoping you could help me work that out."

"That's me." He pointed, as if making sure she hadn't failed to see it. Not that anyone with eyes could miss the sight. "That's some kind of shrine with pictures of me all over it."

"To be fair, some of them are of you and Jack." There was another room just over from here that was solely dedicated to Jack. But considering she'd only just convinced Ianto to come with her instead of rushing back to let Jack know he was still alive, she didn't think he needed to see that just now.

"But what the hell is it doing here. Why is it here? Are they—are they worshipping me or something?"

"Worshipping. Idolizing. Generally revering that gorgeous face of yours. Yup, they're doing all that."

"But, how? Why?"

"That, Mr. Jones, is what we're here to find out."


	2. Chapter 2

This was insane. And considering all the completely batty things he'd seen with Torchwood over the years, him calling anything insane was not a small statement by any stretch of the imagination.

Ianto took several unsteady steps back and bumped into the door behind him. He had to get out of here. It was too much. Too much of him. Too much everything. Pieces of his life littered across the room like someone had torn up every moment and scattered them again without any sense or meaning.

He spun away from the sight, but the image was burned into his mind. He couldn't get enough air, like when he'd woken up on the floor under that red sheet in the gym all of—what? Ten, fifteen minutes ago? Yet here he was on some world light-years away from Earth and too far into the future.

So far away from Jack.

His chest ached, burned, like his lungs had forgotten how to work properly.

"I need air," he mumbled, stumbling through the doorway. The ache spread rapidly from his chest to the rest of his body. Out in the corridor, he had no direction in mind, could barely see straight from the dizziness making his head spin. All he knew was that he needed to get out. Outside. Feel the fresh, cool air on his face, gulp in huge lungfuls of it until he forgot the memory of what it felt like to suffocate in his own body.

That was all he could remember of the last few minutes, before everything had gone dark. The panic of being trapped in his own body as it'd failed him. He'd recognized death, and this time it was taking him. Not Owen, or Tosh, or even Suzie. Not Jack, who'd lived a million different deaths over countless lifetimes. It had been him that death had come for, and he hadn't been able to do anything but lay in Jack's arms and panic about all the second and minutes he and Jack hadn't spent together. Worry that in the long lifetimes to come, Jack would find someone else—probably a hundred someone elses—and forget him. The memories of every wonderful moment they'd spent together fading until they might as well have not existed in the first place.

He'd known for ages now, about Jack being immortal. He'd already reasoned that one day, Jack would watch him die, and had mostly been okay about it. But he'd never really comprehended the emotion of what that meant. Now, he understood intimately. How was he supposed to face Jack and pretend like that shadow wasn't hovering over every moment they spent together?

He finally reached the outer door and weakly pushed through, dropping to sit on the front step, pressing a hand over his pounding heart. Whatever happened with Jack, they'd figure it out. They always did.

But first, he needed to know why the hell a bunch of people on a distant planet in the future had dedicated a creepy shrine to him, worthy of a serial killer.

"Here, drink this. It'll help counteract the drugs."

He glanced up to see the Doctor standing next to him, holding a glass of thick, greenish liquid. She wasn't what he'd expected after all the stories Jack had told him. A shortish, blond bundle of energy, yet her eyes were deep and vast with lifetimes worth of knowledge.

"Drugs? What drugs?"

She nodded back toward the building. "The incense. It has slightly mind-altering properties. You must have been more susceptible to it after being exposed to the sleeping beauty virus."

"Sleeping beauty— You know what, I don't want to know." He took the drink from her and sniffed it. Smelled a little sweet, with a sharp kick at the end. "What's in here?"

"Plants, mostly. I think. Don't really know, but you'll definitely feel better if you drink it."

He eyed her for a long moment. Jack had told never trust a word The Doctor said. That he—she could turn a person upside down and inside out with a few sentences. Of course, Jack had also said he trusted The Doctor with his life, and she'd already saved him once today.

Reluctantly, he took a mouthful, but then almost spat it out again. Except The Doctor slapped a hand over his mouth to stop him and then pointed chidingly at him.

"No you don't. Swallow it down."

It took two tries, but he managed to get the foul tasting, thick brew down. Except then he gagged.

"And no bringing it up again either!" The Doctor scooted away from him.

"God, that was horrid." He set the glass down and then had to look away from it. Even the sight was making his stomach lurch.

"Give it a minute."

He sat forward and put his head in his hands. "Will it help with the fact that it feels like my skull is about to explode? What was all that back there, in the temple? How do they know about me? Why do they even care?"

"Like I said, that's what we're here to find out. I came across it quite by accident. It's marked on the city map as a minor tourist attraction; Ianto's shrine. I've searched far and wide, and apart from documentation in your own time, there's a few other reference to you throughout time and space. I plan on checking them all eventually. This, however, is the most interesting one and more likely to provide us with answers."

"Did you really need to bring me here to work it out? I'm fairly sure I could have lived my life without knowing about it."

"I know it's hard to process." The Doctor put her hand on his knee and he looked up to meet her gaze, understanding and empathy in her features. "But no one knows you better than you. I can study it all I want, but you may be the only one who can see the clue we need to figure out why this happened."

"I suppose that makes sense." He glanced away, not liking that her reasoning was swaying him. Logic had always been his weak point. If it made sense, he'd follow through, even if he didn't want to. "It's just a lot, you know. It feels wrong, to see all those moments of my life I thought were private pinned up to a wall. I feel—"

"Exposed? Vulnerable?"

His lips quirked up in a quick, cynical smile. "With a side of pissed off."

"Once we have our answers, I'll do what I can to get rid of it, if that's what you want. I spent years erasing myself from history. And considering all the things I've done, if I can cease to exist, then Ianto Jones from 21st century Cardiff can certainly be forgotten."

Her words were too close to his fears about Jack—that the man he loved so deeply would eventually forget all about him. The back of his throat got tight and he had to swallow to keep the emotion at bay.

"I don't want to be completely erased." His voice came out a little rough, so he cleared his throat. "I just don't want people worshipping me like I'm something special. Because I'm really not."

The Doctor sent him a chiding look. "That's not true at all. You are special. Why else do you think Jack fell head over heels for you?"

Her words actually made him flustered, and he felt his cheeks getting warm on a blush.

"I don't know. I was there, we spent a lot of time together… it just happened."

"Nothing in this universe just happens, Mr. Jones." The Doctor pushed to her feet. "There are patterns and designs forming all around us all the time. Some stretch back hundreds of years. A choice someone else made for the most insignificant reason, which led to you being born, and us standing on this street right now."

Her words sunk in, on a level he'd never considered all of time before. It was vast and made him seem like a speck in comparison.

"Well, that's—"

"Mind blowing. I know. Don't think about it too much. I can fix a sleeping beauty virus, but I definitely can't do anything about melted brains."

She held out a hand and he let her pull him up. True to what The Doctor had said, the disgusting drink seemed to have done the trick. His head felt clearer and his body a little more energized. The dragging after effects from lack of oxygen and waking up from the virus had even improved. He eyed the glass, debating whether to choke down another mouthful. No, he couldn't do it. Whenever they got back to the TARDIS, he'd see if The Doctor had somewhere he could make a cup of tea. That'd fix him right up.

"Think you're ready to face it now?" The Doctor was studying him closely, and he could tell from the glint in her eyes, if he told her no, she'd accept it and leave him be for now. But putting it off would be pointless, even though going back in there was the last thing he wanted to do. The sooner they figured this insanity out, the sooner he could get back to Earth. Back to Torchwood. And Jack.

"Before we go in, tell me what you know about it." He could feel his shoulders getting tight as he stared at the door. "It's a shrine. But why? Do they actually pray to it or something?"

"Admittedly, I've found out very little. As far as I can tell, they don't pray or anything like that, it's more the representation of it. They leave small gifts as a kind of remembrance. But when I asked anyone inside what the remembrance was for, none of them could tell me. Of course, the mind-altering incense probably doesn't help."

"Okay, I can handle that. I just didn't want to find anyone on their knees in front of me."

She arched an eyebrow, all but smirking at him as he belatedly realized how that had sounded.

"You know what I meant. Don't bring Jack into this."

She gave a quick laugh and held up her hands. "I didn't say anything, especially about Jack. That was all you, blue-eyes."

Jack had been right, The Doctor had a way of making a person think twice about everything they said.

"Come on, let's get this over with." He turned and went through the door to the inside, hoping the drug laced incense didn't affect him so quickly this time. As he went through to the room on the left side of the corridor, he braced himself for the weirdness of seeing himself. The Doctor could have at least given him a warning the first time so he'd had some idea of what he was walking into.

Looking at it all at once, however, was too much to take. So he forced himself to walk all the way up to check one picture at a time.

The Doctor stopped next to him as he reached out to touch a photo. At least, he thought it was a photo. It turned out to be some kind of holograph image that wavered when his fingers came in contact with the field.

It played through a few seconds of footage over and over. Him and Jack eating Chinese in Jack's office, a few days after their first night together, around the time that disaster had unfolded with Suzie being resurrected. He was laughing at something Jack had said, and from the way Jack watched him, it seemed that he'd done it on purpose, just for the enjoyment of seeing him happy. Funny, but that wasn't how he remembered the moment. He could have sworn Jack had been laughing right along with him. God, that night seemed like a million years ago.

"Any thoughts so far?" The Doctor asked in a quiet voice. She touched another image, and this one showed that horrible day when the Daleks had infiltrated Torchwood. They hadn't been able to do anything to stop it. Jack had his arms around both him and Gwen, but he was leaning his cheek into Ianto's hair. In that second, he'd been sure that they were all about to die.

And suddenly, as he glanced over a few more still-images without touching them, he could see a clear snap-shot.

"This is all archived security footage from the Torchwood hub. There's nothing from my life before or after. It's all inside Torchwood."

"Ah-ha. Now we're talking." The Doctor clapped her hands and then rubbed them together. "So what happened inside Torchwood that people found fascinating enough to erect a shrine over?"

"Well, that narrows it down to approximately… oh, five thousand three hundred and forty-eight possibilities."

"So much sass." She turned and faced him with a hand on her hip. "I like it."

Since his sarcasm sometimes got the better of him, that was probably a good thing.

The Doctor pulled some of the images off the wall, bringing them closer to her face to study.

"They still have the date and time stamped in the corner, but it's almost too small to read. I wonder if we could make something out if we put them all in order."

He took half a step back, risking a look at the shrine in totality. "We'd end up here all night, if not days. I don't think sorting them out will tell us anything."

"Do you have a better plan? Because I'm all ears." She made a face. "All ears. Who even came up with that saying? Why would anyone want to be all ears? Could you even imagine if you had ears sticking out from places all over your body?"

He couldn't help smiling at that. "Not to mention the things you'd hear. All the time."

"God, yes. It would not be entertaining at all."

"Well." He took another image down from the wall. "It's going to take ages, but I guess it won't be boring."

"Boring is something you'll never find with me, Mr. Jones."

"No, apparently not," he murmured, turning his attention to the images.

Jack had spent years, decades waiting to find The Doctor. Plus, he'd told him a few bits and pieces about The Doctor's companions, how they were always changed for travelling the cosmos in the TARDIS, and not always for the better. Some had become lost along the way, and some had even died. Probably not that different to working for Torchwood, actually. Maybe he should have been worried that the Doctor had singled him out. Some would probably call it a curse. Either way, for him, it didn't signify. He had a life to get back to in Cardiff. Becoming one of the Doctor's many companions was the last thing he planned to do.


	3. Chapter 3

Who would have thought sorting through a bunch of images would be so relaxing and fun? They'd been at it for over an hour and barely made a dent in the assortment of archived Torchwood security footage. At some point they'd sat down and started arranging the pictures in order along the bottom of the wall.

Actually, The Doctor couldn't remember the last time she'd felt this mellow. Like she could just lay back and let the images fall on her like confetti. Why did that sound so strange? But also hilarious.

She laughed to herself, gaining Ianto's attention. He sent her a lazy smile as he plucked down another image.

"What's so funny?"

"I can't remember." She leaned closer to him. "You know, your eyes really are so blue. What on Earth is wrong with them?"

"There's nothing wrong with them. They're my eyes."

"Maybe it's my eyes. Is there something wrong with my eyes?" She went to lean in again, but almost lost her balance.

He caught her with a short laugh. "Whoa, how's your sea legs?"

"Unsteady, it seems. Except I'm not standing on them. My legs I mean." Her head spun as he pushed her upright and she tried to get her equilibrium back. "Of course!"

"What is it?"

"The incense." She waved her hand around to indicated the air, almost swiping his nose off. "We forgot about the incense. I think I'm high."

He frowned as though he was concentrating very, very hard. His blue eyes were a little unfocused. "I'm not sure if I'm high. I've never been high before. What does it feel like?"

"It feels like this." She poked him in the chest and he looked down at her finger.

"No, I don't think that's it."

"I mean, you're high too. So whatever you feel like is what being high feels like." She replayed the words in her head. She thought they made sense, but maybe they didn't.

"Can you not talk in riddles right now? If I get confused, I think it'll make me dizzy."

He leaned into the wall and closed his eyes like he was all ready to take a kip. Well, that wasn't productive in the least. They needed to get out of here and clear their heads.

"Come on, Mr. Jones. I think it's time we went and found ourselves something to eat."

He opened his eyes as she tugged his arm.

"But the pictures—"

"They're not going anywhere."

Together, they got to their feet, though neither of them were very steady. They leaned on one another as they walked out of the room, laughing as they weaved. In the corridor, they had to stop to avoid running into other people milling around. However, as she tried to side-step around someone, she completely misjudged and bumped into them.

"I'm so very sorry," she exclaimed as Ianto pulled her back again.

"No harm done," the young man replied. He had a girl hanging off his arm, a little like she was holding onto Ianto. "I don't think we've seen you here before."

"No, we're just looking—" Ianto started.

"New!" She declared before he could do something completely unhelpful like tell them the truth. "We're new. Nice to meet you."

She held out a hand, which the couple took turns shaking.

"I'm John—I mean Jane Smith. That's John."

She pointed at Ianto who appeared to be having trouble keeping a straight face as he nodded.

"Your boyfriend is cute," the girl said to her in a conspiratorial-sort-of tone, though she hadn't lowered her voice enough to keep Ianto from hearing her.

"We're not together," Ianto announced in a too-serious manner. "I have a boyfriend."

"Who isn't here," she pinched him, trying to send him a look so he'd go along with her. The incense must have been interfering with his usual investigation-incognito skills. Otherwise, what had Jack been teaching him at Torchwood all this time?

"Ow, why are you pinching me?" He tugged his arm from hers and rubbed the sore spot with a frown.

"It was just your imagination." She patted him on the shoulder as the couple glanced between them, beginning to look suspicious. Time for some redirection. "So, what else do you do around here, besides the incense."

"Well, you know," the girl said.

"No, we really don't," she replied. "We're new, remember? So how about you tell us."

"The infinite unification ceremony."

"The infinite unification ceremony. Doesn't that sound wonderful?" She looked at Ianto, who only shrugged. So helpful.

"Tonight, Pippin and Zalia will be joining those unified in infinity before them," the young man said, still with a hint of suspicion in his features.

"And what might we need to do so we can come along?" she asked, sending the girl a friendly smile since she was being far more receptive.

"Anyone can come. It'll be happening here at sun down."

"You look familiar," the young man suddenly said, attention fixed on Ianto. "Are you sure we haven't met?"

"He just has one of those faces." She reached up to tug his bowler hat a little lower and then took him arm. "We have to go, but we'll see you tonight."

Before they could reply—or the young man could work out Ianto was the same Ianto plastered all over the walls, she hustled him away, leading him out of the temple to the street.

"What just happened?" He took the hat off, running a hand through his hair.

"We just got a chance to find out some more information about who these people are and what they're doing."

"No, I think we just got invited to someone's wedding."

"Well, either way, we can talk to people and see if they can tell us anything we don't already know. Are you hungry? I'm famished."

"Actually, I would sell my soul for a strong cup of tea."

She grinned at him. "How very British of you."

"Welsh. I'm Welsh, remember?" By the amount of insult in his tone, anyone would have thought she'd questioned his integrity.

"Because there's so much difference between the two."

"I'll have you know—"

"Oh, look, food!" She detoured him over to a street cart selling something delicious-smelling. Turned out to be a kind of marinated meat wrapped in a sort of crispy thin bread. They got a serving each, and then went back to the TARDIS.

After eating, she showed him where he could make a cup of tea, smiling since it looked like he was ready to get down on his knees in gratitude. She left him to it and returned to the main console room.

Ianto joined her about ten minutes later with two mugs on a tray. "I made you a cup. And I found some jammie dodgers."

"Oh, I forgot I had those. One of my last regenerations, I loved a jammie dodger. Of course, I also liked fish fingers and custard. It was a thing."

He made a face at her as he handed over one of the mugs. "That sounds disgusting."

"Actually, it's not as bad as you might think." She took one of the biscuits and went to drop into the seat, taking a mouthful of tea. Ianto set the tray on the floor and then sat down next to her.

"Maybe it's still the drug-incense in my system, but I'm pretty sure this is the best cup of tea I've ever had."

Ianto smiled as he sipped his own drink. "I have a knack for beverage making. It's how I got Jack to give me a chance with him at Torchwood three."

"How does it work now, Torchwood?" She shifted to face him. "I mean, Torchwood used to be this huge organization, before the battle at Canary Warf, with hundreds of people employed, endless resources. Now it's down to you, Jack and Gwen. Just the three of you on the frontline against any extra-terrestrial threat?"

"That about sums it up." He glanced down at his hands where they were wrapped around the mug. "I guess it's nothing but an idea now, a memory. We could still run things when we had the hub. While Tosh and Owen were still alive. We were actually quite good at what we did. Saved the world dozens of times."

"Then what happened?" she asked in a quiet voice.

"They died. The hub got blown up." He took a sip of tea, his features becoming resigned. "It's gone, all ashes now. But I guess we'll find a way. We always do."

"Is that what you want to do though? Find a way to keep Torchwood alive?"

"I want to be with Jack." He looked up at her, and she could see he meant that with every fibre of his being. Ianto Jones was special, all right, she could see it in the spark of his blue eyes. Once he loved someone, he loved them fiercely, deeply, with steadfast, unquestioning loyalty. Jack was a lucky man. She only hoped he realized exactly what he'd stumbled across.

"It's not the same thing though, is it?"

He stared at her for a long moment before glancing away, obviously not happy with her observation.

"So is there some kind of plan for this unification thing we're going to tonight?"

Clearly he was trying to change the subject, but she'd let him get away with that little deflective manoeuvre, for now.

"The plan is we go to the ceremony, snoop around and ask lots of nosey questions."

He arched an eyebrow at her. "That's it? That's the extent of your planning?"

She crossed her arms and levelled a challenging look on him. "Okay then, tell me what kind of preparation Torchwood would do for this sort of thing."

"We'd start by getting a floor plan for the building layout so we can map all the entrances and exits. Then we'd make a risk assessment to decide what kind of weapons or tech we might—"

"Good God, that sounds boring."

Ianto stared at her incredulously. "You think being prepared sounds boring? I imagine most people would consider it a smart way to make sure we didn't get killed."

"We're going to a wedding or some such thing. I doubt anyone is going to try to kill us."

"You think?" He gave a short, cynical laugh. "The last wedding I went to, at least half a dozen people died and Gwen almost gave birth to an alien spawn."

"Then it sounds like Torchwood is doing weddings all wrong. The last one I went to, I ate too much cake and caught the bouquet. That seems far more normal."

"Yes, well normal doesn't factor in to anything Torchwood does," he muttered. He grimaced and rubbed his forehead.

"Something wrong?"

"I think the incense is wearing off. Got a splitting headache."

She shifted off the seat and took his cup from him, urging him to lay down. "You've had a long day, Mr. Jones. Why don't you try to get some rest before we go out later?"

"Only for a few minutes," he agreed, closing his eyes.

"A few minutes can make all the difference," she murmured in reply. But he was already asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

When Ianto woke up some time later, The Doctor was nowhere to be seen. He sat up, finding his head felt better at least. The two empty mugs and tray were still sitting on the floor next to the seat, so he picked them up and took them back to the kitchen. Though he hadn't ventured far, the TARDIS seemed like a maze, leaving him wondering exactly how big it was. Amazing that something so compact on the outside could seemingly go on forever.

Once he'd cleaned up what little mess he'd made, he returned to the control console, but still didn't see The Doctor anywhere.

"Doctor?" He called out, wondering if she'd gone out somewhere. He supposed it didn't matter, but the thought of being left alone on an unfamiliar planet so far in the future was a little unnerving.

"Up here!"

He glanced up to see The Doctor leaning over a railing in an upper level that he hadn't even noticed earlier. Unless it hadn't been there before. But that was impossible, wasn't it? An entire level appearing and disappearing. Actually, considering the day he'd had—basically dying in Jack's arms, only to be revived and then whisked away to a distant world colonized by future humans—it was probably completely redundant to say anything was impossible.

Finding the steps, he went up to join her where she was sorting through racks of clothing.

"What are you doing?"

She pulled a pink frou-frou dress out and looked over it. "We'll need something to wear to this unification thing tonight."

"God, no. Not that." He took it from her hand and shoved it away again.

She crossed her arms, looking unimpressed. "Have some experience picking out women's dresses, do you?"

"You've got no idea. Pretty much anything you can think of, I've done it for Torchwood at one point or another." He scooted a few hangars along the rail, checking the dresses until he found something better. "Here try this one."

She didn't bother looking at the dress, but set it aside. "It's only fair I pick you an outfit in return."

"I'll be fine in these." He smoothed both hands over the dark grey vest he had on. It might have been a little on the wrinkled side, but for some reason, the thought of changing made him feel like he was further away from Earth than ever.

"Come on, Mr. Jones. Where's your sense of adventure? I promise you can change into them again as soon as we get back later."

She pulled out a white shirt and pair of black pants. "Here. These should do the job."

He didn't move to take them, so she pressed them against his chest.

"Go on, now. Head through there and get changed. We don't want to be late."

He sighed as he took the garments. "Fine, but if I don't like it, I'm taking them off again."

Following the way she'd pointed, he found a kind of dressing room with spare hangers that he put his own clothes on, then dressed in the outfit The Doctor had picked for him. The black pants were a kind of slim legged, and a little more casual than the pressed trousers he usually wore to work. The white shirt seemed almost old fashioned, only buttoning three quarters of the way up his chest and then gaping open with a single string-tie to keep it together at the top.

He slipped his own shoes back on and then walked out. "I need a neck tie."

The Doctor had put on the loose, light-blue, knee-length dressed he'd picked out. It suited her just as perfectly as he'd guessed.

"No you don't. You look great."

"I feel naked without a tie." He tried to pull the collar closed, but it simply fell open again. "I'm changing back."

"Not so fast." She grabbed his arm and steered him away from the dressing room when he would have gone back in. "We don't have time now. Almost sunset, you know."

"Fine, but I'm lodging an official complaint about the lack of a neck tie."

"Noted. I've got a cool collection of bow ties. Remind me to show you later."

They left the TARDIS, the light in the sky now more a pink colour than the orange it had been during the afternoon. The red star was an amazing sight. He'd never imagined he might see anything like it in his lifetime.

The streets were a little quieter now, some of the shops and stalls closing up for the night; people likely going home to their families. Some things didn't change, it seemed, even five hundred years in the future.

When they walked down the block to the temple, there was a small crowd amassing, slowly making their way inside.

"Notice anything?" The Doctor asked, leaning into him and keeping her voice low.

"They're all couples." Some were men with women, some were men with men, and some were women with women. But there wasn't a single person who looked like they were alone.

"Interesting," The Doctor murmured.

Unusual, yes. But did it have anything to do with what was going on here?

"Hopefully the ceremony won't go for too long," he mumbled under his breath to avoid being overheard now that they were closer to the other couples entering. "I don't want to get high again."

"Oh, that reminds me. Take this." She held out a small yellowish capsule.

"Now what are you trying to give me?"

He took it from her palm and held it up so he could examine it more closely.

"It's to counteract the incense. It's made up of amino acids and a few other bits and bobs. I've already had one. Don't worry, Mr. Jones, poisoning you would be completely counterproductive."

"I'm not worried about getting poisoned so much as throwing up from the foul taste."

"This one tastes just fine."

He put the capsule in his mouth and it immediately dissolved on his tongue. An almost-burning sensation hit the back of his throat, like taking a shot of strong alcohol. He coughed a couple of times, eyes watering.

"Okay, maybe fine was an exaggeration." The Doctor grinned at him, completely unrepentant.

"You might want to think twice about drinking the next cup of tea I make you," he said, voice hoarse.

She didn't look the least bit worried about his threat. "Come on."

They followed the rest of the couples, walking deeper into the temple than last time, past the room where his shrine was situated. At the end of a long corridor, they came to a narrow set of steps. The stairs opened out onto a balcony where there was an unobstructed view of the distant setting red sun.

A couple stood at the front, near the stone balustrade, beneath some kind of bronze structure he supposed was an altar. All the couples who'd come to watch were finding seats on round, flat cushions strewn about the floor. The Doctor snagged two and they went over to the edge of the crowd, keeping to the back and sitting down close to the wall only a few feet from the door.

Once the crowd settled, a woman appeared from a side archway, bowing her head gracefully as people offered her greetings and small gifts.

She stopped in front of the altar, but didn't mount it, leaving the couple standing up there by themselves.

"Lovers and friends, we are gathered here to witness the ultimate act of love. The ceremony of infinite unification is not suited to everyone, and not to be considered lightly. Pippin and Zalia have proven their deep commitment to one another, their love vast and unending."

She held her arms out and a buzzing started up, a bit like a swarm of bees.

"What's that noise?" Ianto whispered to The Doctor, who'd pulled some kind of slim device out of her pocket. "Is that your sonic screwdriver?"

Another thing about The Doctor that Jack had told him. A tool like that certainly would have come in handy around Torchwood, but it seemed The Doctor's was one of a kind.

"Yes," she whispered in return, subtly pointing it toward the altar as the sonic screwdriver made a humming-whirring sound. "That noise is coming from the altar, some kind of energy, I'm guessing."

The woman at the front had started leading the couple through a series of vows, as the buzzing became more intense and the bronze structure bloomed with a muted glow.

The Doctor checked her sonic screwdriver, alarm crossing her features.

"What is it?" If The Doctor was worried, surely that had to be a very bad sign.

"I was right, some kind of quantum energy is amassing." She adjusted a setting on her screwdriver and pointed it at the structure for a second time.

"What for? What's it doing?"

"Well usually I'd say it was going to explode."

"What?" He glanced around, calculating if the door or the railing was closer for a fast escape, and which was likely to end in less chance of them getting injured.

"But it's very well contained. Almost safe. Well, as safe as amassing quantum energy can be."

"Almost safe? Sorry if that doesn't instil me with a lot of confidence. Shouldn't we get out of here?" He shifted up to a crouch, ready to run.

The buzzing turned into a low whine and then cut off.

"Too late."

The Doctor grabbed his arm and he held his breath, pretty much expecting to get blown to pieces.

Golden light flashed from the top of the bronze structure, but it aimed downward, straight into the couple standing beneath it. The two of them lit up, falling together, embracing each other tight. A second later, there was another bright flash, this one almost blinding. He had to glance away, and when he looked back, the couple weren't standing there any longer, but tiny golden particles were floating up into the sky.

"They have joined the infinite unified who've gone before them," the woman at the front announce. "Now, Pippin and Zalia will be together forever in the cosmos."

The crowd cheered as people stood and hugged each other, others sharing passionate kisses.

"What just happened?" he asked. Oh, he had an idea. But he must have been wrong. He had to be wrong.

"What the hell did they just do?" he demanded when The Doctor didn't answer right away.

The expression on her face look almost as dazed and disbelieving as he felt.

"I think—I think they. No. They can't have." She shoved to her feet and hurried through the crowd, crossing the balcony on an angle to cut off the woman who had led the ceremony as she headed toward the archway she'd appeared from earlier.

He was a bit slower getting up, and as he tried to navigate the crowd, a few people tried to pull him in for hugs. The girl they'd met earlier—the one who'd told them about this—stepped into his path and aimed a kiss in his direction, which he avoided directly. By the time he caught up with The Doctor, she was already questioning the woman just inside the archway.

"Did you just do what I think you did?"

"I didn't do anything," the woman huffed in reply. "I only facilitate the ceremonies."

"What happened to them?" he asked, but neither woman looked at him.

"That couple, tell me we didn't all just sit around and watch them get turned into quantum dust."

The woman arched a brow, suspicion creeping into her expression. "Not many people understand the mechanics of what the altar does by sight alone. Most come for the beauty of a couple giving themselves over to an eternity in love."

"Beauty?" The Doctor repeated, tight anger in her voice. "There is nothing beautiful about two young people killing themselves."

"They did what?" Ianto leaned heavily into the nearby wall, mind reeling.

This temple, with its shrine dedicated to him… they were some kind of suicide-pact cult? People were killing themselves in his name?

"I think I'm going to be sick." He bent over at the waist, gulping a breath and trying to force his stomach to stop from churning so much.

The Doctor set a gentle hand on his back.

"It's okay, Ianto. We'll fix this." Her voice was laced with steel, as if nothing and no one would stop her once she set her mind to something.

"There's nothing to be fixed," the other woman snapped, sounding affronted. "Who are you, to think you can come in here and judge us?"

"I'm The Doctor. I'm the person who is going to make sure no one else goes through your infinite unification ceremony."

"And I'm Ianto Jones." He straightened, anger making him forget about feeling sick. "The same Ianto Jones you've got pinned up to your walls down there and I'm telling you it definitely isn't okay that people are making suicide pacts and killing themselves. That's not love. That's horrific."

"Impossible," the woman breathed, backing up a step as her eyes widened.

"Lady, if I've only learned one thing today, it's that nothing is impossible."

"That's a double negative." The Doctor mumbled sideways at him. "I think you mean anything is possible."

"In this situation it works. Okay? No offense, Doctor, but shut up." He glared at the woman who'd officiated over the ceremony. "And you. You go and shut down that machine or device or whatever it is. Right now."

"I can't just shut it off." The woman had gone pale, staring at Ianto like he was a ghost. "They'll know. They'll come for me."

"Who?" The Doctor demanded. "Who are they, the ones who set up this temple? What are their names?"

"I don't know their names." She edged toward the door, clearly ready to flee. "I only know what they call themselves."

"Then what do they call themselves?" The Doctor's voice was sharp with impatience.

"The Timeless. They call themselves The Timeless."


	5. Chapter 5

The Doctor stared at the woman, disbelief making her two hearts skip. No, she couldn’t have heard that right. Or the woman had to mean something else. Not what she was thinking. Not them. Her blood was running cold through her veins.  
“What did you say?” Her voice came out hoarse and she swallowed.  
“That’s all I know, they’re called the Timeless and they demand sacrifices.”  
“Not anymore.” Ianto stalked away from them, heading back out to the balcony.  
The woman who’d officiated the ceremony used the opportunity of her distraction to hurry away, slipping through a heavy wooden door and slamming it behind her.  
The Timeless. It couldn’t be. They’d long since ceased to exist. The Timelords had made sure of it.  
She jogged over to where Ianto had mounted the altar. “Ianto, what are you going to do?”  
He didn’t answer her, features set in concentration as he studied the bronze structure. The few people who hadn’t left the balcony had gone silent, staring at him.  
She pulled out her sonic screwdriver, searching for some kind of control panel. “I should be able to shut it down if we can find the controls.”  
“And what’s going to stop them from turning it on again once we leave?” He rounded to one side of the edifice and put his shoulder against it, pushing all his weight into it.  
“I don’t know if that’s such a good—”  
The structure gave a metallic whine, cutting her off as it began to list to one side. After a long moment of teetering, it toppled over, hitting the stone balustrade and collapsing in a crunch before falling to the street below.  
Breath catching in her chest, she rushed over to look down. Luckily the street had been empty and it hadn’t landed on anyone. Ianto was staring at the spot where it’d gone over the railing as if he hadn’t expected to cause so much destruction.  
“Well, I think we can guarantee no one else will be going through the infinite unification ceremony anytime soon.”  
“Did—did anyone—” He swallowed. “Did anyone get hurt?”  
She crossed the altar to stand in front of him. “The street was clear.”  
“Oh, thank God.” He blew out a hard breath, dropping his head.  
Beyond him, the few people who’d been standing around on the balcony looked like they were starting to get over the shock, swiftly heading for anger. Uh-oh. This had all the potential to turn into a lynch mob.  
“Ianto, I think it might be time for us to leave.”  
He nodded, dragging a hand through his hair. “Can we go back now? Back to Earth, I mean. To Jack. I need to go home to Jack.”  
“Let’s just get out of this place first.”  
He glanced up and finally seem to realize they were the centre of attention, standing there on what had once been the people’s altar.  
“Ah, yes, that seems like it might be a good idea,” he agreed, voice tight with nervous tension.  
They stepped down, but didn’t even make it half way across the balcony before people crowded around them.  
“You’ve desecrated out sacred temple!” someone accused, which was followed by a swell of angry agreements. More people came out to see what the yelling was about, making escape that much harder.  
“Doctor, what you said before about weddings—”  
“Okay, I lied. Occasionally when I go to weddings, people try to kill me.”  
They shifted in closer together as the crowd pressed forward.  
“You were the one who thought we didn’t need a plan,” Ianto said. “What do we do now?”  
“Now, we hope we can reason with the angry mob. Which would be a lot easier to do if you hadn’t thrown their quantum laser over the balcony.”  
“That was an accident.”  
She glanced over her shoulder at him with a disbelieving look.  
“Mostly,” he added, sheepishness edging into his features.  
She held out both hands as the crowd pressed in even closer. Damn it. She hated it when people took her captive. It happened far too often. She wasn’t in the mood to be kidnapped today.  
“All right, that’s enough now.” At her words, the crowd quietened down a little. “We’re very sorry about your altar, but believe me, you’re better off without it. There is nothing glorious about being turned into quantum dust.”  
The angry exclamations swelled again, louder this time.  
“Did you really think that was going to work?” Ianto demanded as they were grabbed and pulled apart.  
“I just told them the truth.” She tugged in annoyance against the two men holding her, but it didn’t do any good.  
“Great, I’ll have that engraved on your tombstone, shall I?”  
“Sass, Ianto. Not helping right now!”  
They were propelled down the stairs and through the temple, going toward the far back of the building. Finally, they were thrust into an empty room.  
She rounded on the men who’d been holding her once they let her go. “What are you going to do with us?”  
“We haven’t decided yet,” one of the men paused to answer as the others left. “But we can’t let this go unpunished. No one else can ever go through infinite unification now because of you.”  
“I think what you meant to say was thank you!” Ianto yelled after them as the door slammed shut. He shoved a hand through his hair, pacing a few short steps in frustration.  
There were a couple of old chairs strewn about the room, most of them not even upright. She picked one up and sat down on it.  
Ianto stared at her, expression incredulous. “So what, you’re just going to sit there and wait until they come back to tell us whatever punishment they’ve decided on?”  
“Exactly.” She crossed her arms and set her attention on the door. Hopefully it wouldn’t be a long wait.  
“No offense, but that’s an absolute rubbish plan. Can’t you use that sonic screwdriver to get us out of here?”  
“Oh, I totally could.”  
“So do it then.” Ianto made a hurry-up motion toward the door.  
“But I’m not going to.”  
He let out an irritated noise and then came over to throw himself in the chair next to her.  
“Why not?”  
“Because of what that woman said. That the people who set up this temple call themselves the Timeless.”  
“Timeless? What’s that?”  
“They shouldn’t be. They can’t be.” The trepidation, the cold dread that’d slithered down her spine when the woman had first mentioned the word returned, making her shiver.  
“It’s serious.” Ianto had lowered his voice, tone dark and sombre. “Whatever this Timeless is, it’s bad. I can tell by the look in your eyes.”  
“They shouldn’t be any more than a dark legend. A story of caution for those who think time is something to play with.” She took a deep breath, forcing away some of the dread just the name had brought up within her. “The Timeless were a race of people, a little like the Timelords, I think, but closer to human. They had just a single heart and weren’t able to regenerate. They wanted only one thing, and put all of their vast resources into achieving it.”  
“And what was that?” Ianto asked quietly, watching her closely.  
“They wanted immortality. To live forever. They believed there was a way to do this by existing outside of time.”  
“But that’s impossible, isn’t it? No one can live outside of time.” Ianto didn’t sound so sure of his own words.  
“There is much about this universe that even the Timelords didn’t understand. But one absolute certainty is that time is for all things. Backwards, forwards, sideways, and upside down. Time is everywhere and everything. There’s no escaping it.”  
“So why were the Timeless so convinced they could do it?”  
She shrugged. “Who really knows. Prophecy, madness, sheer stupid stubbornness. The why doesn’t really matter anymore. The point is, The Timelords supposedly took care of them. It was one of many incidences that led to the Time War.”  
“Took care of them how?” By the wariness in Ianto’s voice, it seemed he’d already guessed.  
“The Timelords weren’t exactly known for their mercy. When faced with a race of people who believed they could live outside the very essence of the Timelord’s existence? Not to mention if they’d succeeded, they would have become powerful beyond even the Timelord’s reach. They wiped them from the very fabric of time and space, of course. Erased any and all evidence of their existence.”  
“Well, I guess that’s one way of doing things,” Ianto replied slowly, as if having trouble comprehending that an entire race of people could be wiped out just like that. “But obviously it didn’t work. Some escaped or something?”  
“I don’t know. Honestly, I’m having trouble with this, and I don’t know if it’s because I just can’t believe it, or don’t want to.” Thousands of years of life, she’d faced Daleks and Cybermen and even threats from the Timelords themselves. But this—she had no idea what it meant if the Timeless really had returned “If even a handful of the Timeless are still out there, still trying to find a way to shift outside of time, then the entire stability of the universe is at risk.”  
“How so?”  
“Some Timelords held the theory that if the Timeless achieved their goal and managed to separate themselves out of time, it could cause the very fabric of reality to collapse.”  
Ianto’s eyes widened slightly. “I’m not even going to pretend I understand what would happen if the fabric of reality collapsed, but I’m going to assume it would be very bad.”  
“End of times, bad.”  
“Right, so let’s try to make sure that doesn’t happen.” He dragged both hands over his face, like it was all too much to process. “So what are we going to do?”  
She pushed straighter in the chair. “We aren’t going to do anything. When I can, I’ll make sure you can get out of here. You need to head back to the TARDIS and wait for me.”  
He turned in his chair to face her, expression becoming stubborn. “You brought me here because you needed my help. And it’s not like I don’t have any experience dealing with alien threats. I was one of the only people to survive the battle against the Cybermen at Canary Warf. I’ve faced Daleks and aliens who want to get high on children. You’re not sidelining me.”  
She sat forward and braced her hands on her knees. “And what if you had to face all of those threats at once? Do you think you would survive that? The Timeless are more dangerous than anything else you’ve ever encountered. Anything that anyone has encountered. And no offense, Mr. Jones, but if I hadn’t turned up when I did, you would have died from that virus the 456 released. Jack certainly thinks you’re dead.”  
He shoved to his feet, making the chair tip over and clatter against the floor. “Do you really think I needed reminding? That’s the last time you mention it, understand me? You’ve got no idea what it was like, no idea what it felt like lying there, suffocating in my own body while Jack begged me not to leave him. I thought it hurt when Lisa died. But this—The pain I felt at knowing it was my end, that Jack would go on living and in a few years, forget all about me. I thought heartbreak was just a saying, but it’s true, you know. It felt like my heart was being torn out of my chest.”  
She stood and crossed over to him, emotion tightening the back of her throat. “Ianto, I’m so sorry. I won’t say anything about it again. I promise.”  
He blinked, eyes damp as he glanced away. “You brought me here for a reason. So let me help you.”  
It was a bad idea. She could respect him wanting to fight alongside her, but the risk was immeasurable. She’d let a lot of people she’d cared about walk into dangerous situations over her long years. A lot of the time they came out fine, but sometimes they didn’t. She’d already brought Ianto back from the brink of death once today, it seemed rather counterproductive to let him walk right back into it again.  
“You’re right. I did bring you here for a reason. But this wasn’t it. You really think I want to go back and tell Jack how I saved you, only to get you killed?”  
He gave a half-laugh, half-sob and then sniffed. “That was low. Of course I’m not going to argue with that.”  
“I know. I’d like to say I don’t always stoop so low, but desperate times happen more often than you might think.”  
A rattle sounded on the other side of the door, like a lock being opened. She turned, keeping herself in front of him, feeling unaccountably protective of the gorgeous Welshman.  
“No matter what happens, follow my lead. And for God’s sake, whatever you do, don’t die.”


	6. Chapter 6

Ianto clenched his fists as the door opened and five people stepped into the room; three men and two women, including the couple they’d met earlier who’d invited them to the ceremony.   
Usually when he went out with Torchwood, he had a gun on him. Right now, he was wishing they had even one weapon between them to protect themselves against what had turned out to be a crazy drugged-out cult of people who liked to kill themselves.   
The Doctor pulled out her sonic screwdriver and pointed it like a gun. What was she going to do, threaten to remove all the screws in the vicinity so their furniture fell apart next time they sat on it? Or did the device actually have a maim and/or kill setting he didn’t know about?  
“Now, listen here you lot.” The Doctor’s announcement made the five of them pause at least. “Whatever you think is going on in this place with your happy-incense and your frankly stupid unification ceremonies, I’m telling you it’s not what you think. You’re being used by an ancient race who don’t care one whit about you.”  
A few of the people exchanged glances, but it didn’t look like The Doctor was convincing them of anything.   
“Think of the scariest thing you can imagine, and then multiply it by ten. That’s who is behind all this. If they’re coming because we destroyed their quantum laser, then the smartest thing you can do, the only thing you can do, is run as far and fast as you can.”  
“Lies.” One of the women said. “Who sent you here to destroy us?”  
“No one sent us.” Ianto shifted forward, closer to stand by The Doctor’s shoulder. “We came to help you.”  
“You were right, Leon,” one of the men said. “He does look like Ianto Jones.”   
“That’s because I am Ianto Jones.” Frustration rippled through him. He’d had enough of this situation.   
These people didn’t have a clue about reality, and right now, they were the one thing standing between him and getting home to Jack.   
“If you won’t listen to The Doctor, then listen to me. This ends now, this whole insane cult. Go home and find some other meaning in your life, because this is all emptiness. None of it is real. You’re puppets for something you can’t begin to understand. Hell, I don’t even understand it. But if the Doctor says run, then you should run. And hope to God whatever it is doesn’t ever catch up with you.”  
The girl who’d tried to kiss him earlier drifted forward, eyes wide in awe. “Leon, it’s really him. It’s a miracle.”  
“I’m not a miracle,” he snapped. He was weak, he’d made terrible mistakes, hurt the people he loved the most, once come so close to taking his own life, he still wasn’t sure how he’d survived the night. He was a fraud. The last person anyone should build a shrine to.   
“I was brought here through technology, not by some mystical means. Now I’m telling you, let The Doctor and I go, and leave this place, before it’s too late for all of us.”  
“It’s a trick,” Leon announced in a loud voice, obviously trying to convince the others. “Some kind of test of faith. He destroyed our unification altar. The real Ianto Jones wouldn’t have done that.”  
A few of them murmured their agreements.   
“The Enlightened Ones demanded cleansing for their crime,” Leon continued. “They will be immersed in the blessed waters, as we were instructed to do.”  
Two of the men came forward and grabbed them.   
“Immersed in water? That doesn’t sound so bad,” he said in a hopeful tone as their hands were bound in front of them.   
“You did not just say that.” The Doctor cast him an unimpressed look. “It’s never just water, Ianto. Believe me.”  
They were marched from the room, and this time when they reached the end of the corridor, instead of going up to the balcony, they took another door opening onto a set of steps going down, underground.   
“See?” she told him in a chiding voice. “When they take you down to a cellar, it never ends well.”  
He didn’t reply, but he did roll his eyes at her.   
“Sass,” she muttered, except she sounded more amused about it than annoyed.   
As they went further down, the atmosphere became humid, while a subtle sharp scent laced the air. The Doctor inhaled deeply, as if she was trying to figure out what she was smelling. By the time they reached the bottom where it opened into a natural stone cavern, he was pretty sure The Doctor had been right and the answer definitely wasn’t just water.   
He stopped, apprehension tightening his stomach as his gaze fixed on the large central pool where a white vapour was drifting off the top of the liquid.   
“Is that—”  
“Acid,” she supplied with false cheer when he didn’t finish. “Natural acid springs.”   
“Over here.” One the men who’d led them down the steps shuffled them to the side and then forced them to sit against the wall. “You will be silent while we prepare you for cleansing.”  
“Like hell—” He started to get up again, but the guy punched him in the midsection, leaving him wheezing. He dropped back down next to The Doctor, stomach hurting.   
She leaned into him as the man turned away to watch the others who’d gathered around the stone edge of the acid pool to light candles.   
“I’ll get us out of this, okay? Just don’t draw any more attention to yourself.”  
“So you have a plan?” His voice came out a little hoarse from the ache in his abdomen.  
“Well, not exactly. But I usually figure something out.”  
“Usually?”  
She sent him an impatient frown. “I’m not perfect, I can’t always think of everything.”  
He leaned his head back against the wall. “Now I know what Jack meant when he said if you ever turned up, it was sure to be a very bad day.”  
She cut him an indignant look. “Excuse me, but I don’t think Captain Jack Harkness can talk. He makes plenty of his own trouble.”  
“I prefer his kind of trouble,” he muttered, wishing Jack was here for the first time since he’d been dragged on this insane trip with The Doctor.   
The people over by the acid springs lit up sticks of incense when they were finished with the candles, inhaling over them deeply.  
“Fantastic,” he commented, heavy on the sarcasm. “They’re getting more high than they already were.”  
“Which will probably make it easier for us to escape from them, since we’re not,” The Doctor shot back.   
He’d forgotten about taking that capsule before they’d come in here. Lucky, or he would have been out of his head by now. “How long will that will last for?”  
“Your guess is as good a mine.” The Doctor shrugged. “A few hours, or an entire day. I can’t say I’ve ever had to make anti-acid-trip medication before today.”  
The girl who’d been so awestruck about him earlier drifted over, holding one of the incense sticks.   
“Here, Hextor, you join the others, I’ll watch them.”  
The young man smiled and took the incense from her, heading over to the three by the acid pools. He’d barely walked off when the girl came over and sat on his lap. And since he was tied up, there wasn’t a thing he could do about it. This just kept getting better.   
“I can’t believe you’re really here.” She took his face between her hands. “Will you bless me?”  
He jerked his head back from her grasp. “I told you before, I’m not anyone special. I’m just a guy from the 21st century who happens to make amazing coffee.”  
“Amazing?” The Doctor interjected, scepticism clear in her voice.   
“Yes, amazing. And I want to get back to making coffee in the 21st century.” He held up his bound hands in front of the girl. “So if you could just let me go?”  
She frowned, not happy, but seemed to be considering it. “If I let you go, will you bless me?”  
“Of course I bloody—”  
The Doctor elbowed him, cutting off his words.   
“He would love to. A bit hard to give someone a blessing with your hands tied up, isn’t it?”  
“Oh, yes!” She shifted off his lap to kneel next to him. Thank God.   
He held out his hands and let her tug the knots, but unfortunately her fingers weren’t exactly coordinated; no doubt from all the incense she’d inhaled. He kept glancing toward the others over by the acid pool, worried they were going to turn around any second now and see what was going on.   
Once the rope was loose enough, he took over, unravelling it from around his wrists. He turned to The Doctor, but the girl grabbed his arm, almost pulling him off balance.  
“My blessing?”  
He glared at The Doctor. This had been her idea after all.   
The Doctor motioned with her tied hands, clearly fighting a grin. “Go on, bless the poor girl.”  
He couldn’t ever remember feeling more awkward about anything in his life, but he turned to the girl, no idea what to do or say.   
“Um… I, Ianto Jones, bless thee—” He stopped since he didn’t know what her name was.   
“Linlea,” the girl supplied eagerly.   
“I bless thee Linlea. Now go on your way. In peace.” He waved his hands over her in a vague motion.   
“And love?” she added hopefully.   
“Peace and love. Now off you go.” He gave her a gentle nudge, not-so-subtly trying to get her to move faster.  
Instead she grabbed his hand and kissed the backs of his knuckles. “Thank you. Oh, thank you!”   
He extracted his hand from her grasp with a grimace, while behind him, it sounded suspiciously like The Doctor was trying to smother her laughter.   
Finally, Linlea let him go and returned to the others, who were so high, they didn’t seem to notice that no one was guarding them any longer.   
He untied the knots and tugged the rope free, and then helped The Doctor to her feet. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a key, holding it up for him.   
“Here, take this.”   
“What is it?” he asked as he took it in his fingers and then closed it into his fist.   
“The key to the TARDIS. Run as fast as you can and don’t stop until you get back.”  
“I’m not leaving without you.” Not after all this. He couldn’t leave her to face The Timeless on her own, not after the haunted look she’d gotten in her eyes when she’d talked about them. He knew that look, it was one he’d seen in the mirror occasionally. When the dark things inside you were so terrifying, even shedding the tiniest ray of light on them risked unravelling your mind.   
“I’m not staying, believe me. But I promised I’d take down that shrine, and I don’t plan on breaking any of the promises I made you, Ianto Jones.”  
He wanted to tell her not to worry about it, that they should just get back to the TARDIS and forget they’d even been here. But he didn’t think he’d be able to sleep at night when he got home, knowing the shrine was still out there somewhere.  
“Let me help you. We’ll take it down together.”   
She took his arm, and together they sidled along the wall until they reached the door. Once they hit the stairs, they ran, not worrying about being seen anymore.   
At the top of the steps, The Doctor paused. “Go back to the TARDIS, Ianto. I’ll be right behind you.”  
He hesitated, and she settled a firm look on him. “Don’t make me bring Jack into this.”  
“Okay, okay.” He held up both hands in surrender. “But if you’re not in the TARDIS in ten minutes, I’m coming back here to find you.”  
“Yes, sir, Mr. Jones.” She saluted him with a wide grin and the truth of it all hit him.   
“You’re actually enjoying this, aren’t you?”  
“You’re not?” she asked, a knowing spark in her eyes.   
A few years ago, he would have replied with an emphatic no. He’d told Tosh once that he didn’t get it; the addiction to the adrenaline rush, the look the team all got on their faces when they went out in the field and stood up against danger and death. But after a few missions with Jack, he’d finally started to understand. So yes, it was insane and there’d been a few moments when he’d questioned whether they were going to get out of this mess in one piece. But, bloody hell, part of him did enjoy it.   
“I’ll see you back at the TARDIS,” he told her instead of replying to her question.   
She nodded and then hurried along the corridor toward his shrine room. When she’d disappeared, he checked the way was clear and started creeping quickly along hallway. He was almost to the main doors at the front of the building and thinking he was actually going to get out without being seen when a door on his left suddenly swung open and a man sauntered out into his path.   
He skidded to a halt, unable to believe his eyes. No way.   
“Well, hello there, eye-candy. Long time no see.”


	7. Chapter 7

The shrine room was empty when The Doctor slipped inside. Someone had been here since she and Ianto had tried to put some of the meta-images in chronological order, because all the ones they’d moved to the bottom of the wall had been returned to their previous places in the display.   
She took out her sonic screwdriver and adjusted the setting, then aimed it at the wall. After a sustained burst, the holographic images all fizzed into nothingness, the liquid nano-chips that powered them all fried.  
Satisfied with the destruction, she hurried across the corridor to Jack’s room that Ianto hadn’t seen, and repeated the procedure with her sonic screwdriver so there was nothing left. Possibly they still had archived Torchwood hub security footage somewhere around here, but she was hoping between the complete annihilation of the quantum laser and now the obliteration of their shrines, the people would decide starting over wasn’t worth it.   
She quickly left the temple and hurried back to the TARDIS, but when she arrived, it was locked up tight, no sign of Ianto. Just great. She’d managed to lose him in the whole ten minutes they’d been apart. Had the cult members recaptured him before he’d been able to sneak out of the temple? It was the only explanation that made sense.   
“And back I go,” she muttered to herself with a sigh, turning to retrace her steps.   
When she returned to the temple, she made sure to keep herself out of sight, but it seemed apparent in the time she’d been gone, everyone had left.   
She went down to the underground cavern to make sure Ianto hadn’t been taken back there, but didn’t find any sign of him. She really hoped it wasn’t because he’d been dissolved into the acid springs.   
Back up in the main part of the temple, she checked behind a few doors but didn’t find even a single person she could ask.   
“Where are you, Ianto Jones?” she muttered to herself as she checked yet another room and came up empty.   
She went up the stairs, but instead of walking out to the balcony, detoured to the left, trying to find where that woman had disappeared to earlier; the one who’d officiated the unification ceremony and told them about the Timeless.   
The next door she opened seemed to be some kind of office. She took out her sonic screwdriver and scanned, looking for any signs of advanced technology. The device picked up something in the bookcase. Heading over, she studied it, looking for anything out of place, then used the sonic screwdriver up close and personal. Ah-ha. Not on the bookcase. Behind it.   
“So cliché.” She shook her head, disappointed at the utter lack of imagination in hiding something behind a bookcase and expecting people not to find it.   
When the bookcase swung away from the wall, she found a silver panel of blinking lights and buttons.   
“Aren’t you beautiful?” she murmured, studying the layout. The technology had been using the acid in the springs below as a power source for the quantum laser. There was also a communications array component to it.   
“And just who have you been talking to?” She ran her sonic screwdriver over it and then checked the readings, but didn’t get a clear idea of where the transmissions had been coming from or going to. She rubbed her hands together, loving the idea of taking this gorgeous little piece of technology apart to find the answer. “Guess I’ll have to dig deeper.”  
Possibly she should have left it until she’d found Ianto. But he’d worked for Torchwood for years, and kept telling her how capable he was. She’d just choose to believe he could cope for another few minutes while she checked whether she could get any answers out of this control panel.  
She ran her sonic screwdriver around the seam, looking for the point where she could remove the outer panel, but voices outside in the corridor made her pause. They were definitely getting closer. Quickly, she swung the bookcase closed again and then searched the room for a hiding spot. Unfortunately, her options were limited; the furniture was sparse and there weren’t any curtains.   
“Honestly, what kind of person doesn’t have curtains?” She hurried over to a tall plant in the corner, ducking behind the fronds just as the door opened.   
The woman from earlier walked in, followed by a man.  
“Are you absolutely certain its him?” the man asked as they crossed the room.   
“I’m telling you, he said he was Ianto Jones,” the woman replied in an impatient tone as if she’d already said it several times before. “It looked just like him. And he said the woman with him was The Doctor.”  
“But they told us The Doctor was a man. How can a woman be The Doctor?”  
“Maybe because gender is irrelevant,” she muttered under her breath, leaning to the side slightly so she could see what they were doing.   
They’d stopped in front of the bookcase and swung it open as she had a moment ago.  
“I have no idea. But you know our standing instructions. If The Doctor, Ianto Jones or Jack Harkness ever found their way here, we had to tell them immediately.”  
“Then why the delay?” the man asked, watching as she accessed the control console.   
“You misunderstand. I didn’t delay in the least. I came in here and sent a transmission right away. Someone already arrived to take care of it. The silver chamber is open.” She accessed the communications. “I’m just letting them know he’s been successful in acquiring Ianto Jones.”  
Damn it, he had been recaptured. This time by someone the Timeless had sent.   
“That’s bad. Very, very bad,” she mumbled, tightening her grip on the sonic screwdriver.   
“What about The Doctor?” the man asked.   
“Not essential. Ianto was the one they really wanted.”  
“Oh, come now.” She stepped out from behind the plant, pointing her sonic screwdriver at the pair. “I wouldn’t say I’m not essential. A bit harsh, really, since apparently I was the fool who brought Ianto into what was clearly a trap set for him.”  
“One of several throughout time and space,” the woman replied, not seeming too concerned about their plans being discovered.  
“Where is he?” she demanded, interjecting a cold note of ferocity into her voice.   
“Being prepared in the silver chamber.” The woman tilted her chin up, a challenge in her stare, like she considered herself invincible.   
“More batty cult ceremonies? What is it with you people?” She shifted her aim with the sonic screwdriver and pointed it at the control console behind the pair, making it hiss, spark and flash, ending with a thin curl of blue smoke drifting up from it. “Next time, I won’t be aiming for the equipment. Now tell me where he is.”  
The two of them exchanged a quick glance, and while the woman looked like she was ready to stubbornly take the answer to her grave, the man’s expression was wavering. She closed the remaining distance between them and poked the sonic screwdriver into the middle of his chest.   
“You. Out with it before I make your heart explode inside your chest.”  
A sweat broke out on his forehead. “Downstairs, through the courtyard, there’s a storeroom, but it opens into some kind of silver-lined room. We were told never to go in there unless any of you turned up. The man they sent took Ianto in there.”  
She dropped her arm and sent the man a smile. “There now, that wasn’t so hard, was it? And for the record, I wasn’t really going to make your heart explode inside your chest. Because truthfully, it would have been more likely your heart exploded out of your chest and I can tell you, cleaning off aortic blood takes forever.”  
She stepped back and the man wilted a little, while the woman glared daggers at her like she wanted her to expire on the spot.   
“It’s too late,” the woman said in a shrill voice. “They have a plan, the Timeless. A plan greater and more wonderous than any of us can comprehend. Ianto will play his part in that plan, as they have decreed.”  
“Seriously, you really smoked the pipe and bought the farm.” She shook her head. “Here’s an idea, maybe spend a little less time inhaling that incense.”  
“You can’t stop them!”   
The woman started to rush forward, but The Doctor ran out the door and yanked it shut behind her, using her sonic screwdriver to lock it.   
A wave of apprehension washed over her as she hurried down the stairs. She’d known something was moving in the far, dark corners of the universe, getting ready to emerge, and that somehow Ianto had been part of it. Yet she could never have imagined it would turn out to be the Timeless.  
And she’d played right into their hands. She’d gone back and saved him on the day he should have died, created a new reality, a new history, and then she’d brought him right to them.   
Whatever plans The Timeless had, it seemed she’d just handed them the key. Somehow, she had to find a way to stop them. One that didn’t involve Ianto being killed, because with her choice to save him, his life had now become her responsibility. If only she knew what they needed him for.


	8. Chapter 8

“What the hell are you doing?” Ianto demanded as Captain John Hart strapped him down to a kind of operating table and then hit a button to raise it upright. “Last time I saw you, you helped us. You said you wanted to change.”  
“Correction. I helped Jack. I wanted to change for Jack.” John paced around him, resting both his hands on the belt riding low around his waist with various weapons attached. “But then I realized I was going about it all wrong. Instead of changing for Jack—because, let’s face it, eye-candy, he wasn’t ever going to take me back or forgive me. I should have been trying to change to be more like Jack.”  
John had once been Jack’s partner in the 51st century when he’d worked for the Time Agency—whatever that was. Jack had never actually explained any of it. The pair had done far more than just work together for five years, and that same bitter acid of jealousy he’d felt last time John had paid them a visit bubbled up in his stomach again.  
“What does that even mean?” He jerked his hands against the thick leather straps keeping them in place.  
“Jack won the cosmic lottery. He’s immortal. Forever. Can’t die. Just traipses about the universe shagging and killing and doing whatever the hell he wants. All without the fear of death.”  
John stepped closer and grabbed his chin in a pinching grip. He gave a laugh. “I mean, can you even imagine it, eye-candy? The utter, heady freedom of it. What a gift.”  
“You know Jack doesn’t see it that way. He says it’s a curse,” he forced out through a clenched jaw.  
“Yeah, well, Jack always was a stick in the mud. He could find the downside to getting off with a pair of sexually ambiguous twin acrobats.” John ran a gaze over his face. “I can see why you caught his eye, though. You are delicious.”  
“Go to hell.”  
John laughed again, but did let go of his chin. “Been there, done that. Got kicked out.”  
“So, what, now you’re working with the Timeless?”  
John sent him a surprised, but impressed look. “Well, aren’t you clever? Brains and beauty. Are you trying to turn me on?”  
“Just answer the question!” He yanked at his wrists again, more out of frustration than any idea he might actually be able to loosen them.  
“I heard about them, the Timeless. Fearful whispers in some bar on the edge of the universe where people go to lose their sanity.”  
“So you thought, oh, they sound like nice people. Think I’ll go work for them,” he shot back, anger getting the better of his sarcasm.  
“Whoa, now, you could poke someone’s eye out with that sharp tongue of yours.” John paced another few steps in front of him, like he had all day to stand around and boast about his brilliant plans that always screwed everyone around him. “Most of it was myth and misinformation. It took me years, but I finally found them. Used every contact and called in every scrap of favour anyone owed me all up and down the sodding galaxy. I told them about Jack. Fixed point in time and everything he is. See I thought we could be partners, form an alliance. Work out what makes Jack tick. What keeps him beyond the usual restriction of time.”  
“It was an anomaly. You think he hasn’t tried to work out if it can be reversed, if he can use it to heal others? He’s thought of everything, there is no answer.”  
Bloody John, he’d sold Jack out to the Timeless. If everything The Doctor had said about them was true and they were coming for Jack—  
Desperation and cold, icy fear ripped through him. He’d do anything to stop that from happening. Even die again.  
“Oh, eye-candy. So human. Such a small, uncomprehending mind. I don’t know how Jack puts up with living on that tiny inbred planet you call home.” John set both hands against his cheeks and leaned in until there were only inches separating their faces. “The Timeless are ancient. They know things humans haven’t even been able to imagine yet. If anyone can figure out Jack’s secret, it’s them.”  
“He cared about you once. How could you betray him?”  
“Cared about me?” John grinned, gloating. “He loved me. Told me every other day for two years. And yes, I betrayed him, because in the end, love is as fickle and pointless as every other god damn thing in this universe.”  
He tried to turn his head away so he didn’t have to look at John anymore, his stomach burning. But the captain wouldn’t let him go.  
“You think you’re special? That you’re the one who’ll change him, make him stay a lifetime until you’re a shrivelled husk of yourself? Well, let me tell you the truth about Captain Jack Harkness. Love is the one thing he is absolutely terrified of. He won’t keep you. Give him a few years, and he’ll find some way of getting rid of you, maybe even make it seem like it was your idea. It’ll be like a handful of weeks to him. Just enough time to realize that you’re no different to any other hundred men and women he’s supposedly loved.”  
“Shut up, you don’t know anything about us.”  
John laughed. “They all say that. Come up with something original, why don’t you.”  
His breath had gotten too short, John’s word hurting more than he wanted them to. But the hurt only fed his anger.  
“Fine. You know everything about it, everything about him. Then you know he’ll find a way to stop you.”  
“He can try to stop me.” John leaned in even closer, inhaling deeply. “But he won’t be able to stop them. No one can. Unfortunately, it turns out they’re even more ruthless, cheating bastards than I am. We made a deal to bring Jack in together and discover the key to his immortality. But they screwed me over, put a damn chip in my head, and now I have to do what they say or risk having my brain melted on a regular basis.”  
“Sounds like you got what you deserved,” he snarled in return.  
John slammed his mouth down on his in a kiss that was meant to be nothing but punishing. When he pulled back, Ianto tasted blood on his lower lip.  
“Naughty, naughty, eye-candy. When you get home to dear old Jack, make sure you tell him about that, now, won’t you?”  
“You bastard. Let me go!”  
John finally stepped back, but only far enough to pick up what looked like a kind of remote off a nearby trolley.  
“Of course I’m going to let you go. It’s all part of the plan. There’s just a minor formality we have to take care of first.”  
The captain pressed a button on the remote, and above him, the ceiling opened to reveal some kind of apparatus that had instruments attached to it like spider’s legs. A jolt of icy fear ripped through his entire body. The device looked too much like the upgrade unit the Cybermen had used; bringing back a tsunami of memories from the horror of Canary Warf and when Lisa had been killed in the Torchwood hub.  
“What is that? What are you doing?” He wrenched against the binds, not caring if he had to break his bloody arms to escape.  
“Calm down, eye-candy. Nothing to get hysterical over. It’s a simple procedure, really, and once the biochip is in your brain, you won’t even know it’s there.”  
“I doubt I’m going to forget having a chip implanted in my brain,” he yelled back, twisting his body, except all he was doing was making the straps cut into his skin.  
“No, really. You literally won’t know. The first part of the procedure will wipe your memory of the last few minutes.”  
John’s words shocked him motionless. “What?”  
“That’s the beauty of it, why Jack will never see it coming. See, I’m not the one who’s going to hand Jack over to the Timeless, Ianto Jones. You are.”  
He shook his head, fear and dread beginning to overwhelm his system, panic making his mind blank. “No, I won’t do it.”  
“You will, because the chip will tell you to. The minute you see Jack, you’re going to have this overwhelming urge to kill him and keep killing him until you’ve delivered him to the Timeless.” John laughed and hit another button on the remote, bringing the apparatus above to life. “It’s poetry from where I’m standing. Absolute bloody poetry.”  
Oh God. No. Not him. Not Jack.  
The apparatus lowered and he flinched back against the table, but there was nowhere to go. “No! Don’t do this. Please!”  
“The more you struggle, the more it’ll hurt,” John said in a chiding tone. But then he grinned. “Actually, go ahead. Struggle all you want. Either way, you’re still getting chipped.”


	9. Chapter 9

The screaming started just as The Doctor reached the courtyard.   
“Ianto!” She launched into a sprint, following the sound into a storeroom, just like the man upstairs had said. But there was no obvious or immediate opening through to the silver chamber.   
The screaming just kept going, the painful intensity of it making goose-bumps ripple over her skin. He just kept screaming, even as his voice started going hoarse. Oh God. What were they doing to him?   
“Ianto, I’m coming! Just hold on.” She got out her sonic screwdriver, scanning to work out which wall was hiding the opening. But some kind of energy was interfering with it, making it fritz, not giving a clear reading.   
“Come on, don’t fail me now.” She tried again, but still didn’t get any better results.  
“Damn it!” She shoved the screwdriver away and rushed to the nearest wall, tapping on it, trying to work out which was hollow, where his yelling was coming from, even though it seemed like it was echoing from all directions.   
The screaming cut out and her breath caught on a gulp of apprehension, waiting, straining her ears to hear anything.   
“Ianto?”  
Maybe he was just unconscious. God, don’t let him be dead. Again.   
A flash caught her attention, low, from the bottom of the opposite wall. She hurried over and crouched down, running a finger along near the floor. It was definitely a seam. She followed the line, prying her fingers into the corner and then pulling. The wall shifted slightly, just enough for her to wedge her hands in. She yanked, her arms aching as she struggled to shift the heavy barrier. Finally, she made a gap just large enough and squeezed herself through.   
Inside, the room was empty apart from Ianto strapped unmoving to a table in the middle. Some kind of apparatus was just inches above his head, instruments adjusting and measuring as if they were about to begin a procedure.   
She started running across the distance, pulling out her sonic screwdriver. Except it fritzed again, just like it had outside, some kind of energy field in here playing havoc on the device. Skidding to a stop next to him, she adjusted the settings on the screwdriver way up; to a level that could pretty much melt metal and cause brain aneurisms. But she didn’t have another choice and didn’t have time to think of any other answer. She hoped the energy field in here was only dampening the effects of her sonic screwdriver and that turning it up would make it operate closer to normal, not make random things explode.   
“Here goes everything,” she muttered, pressing the screwdriver against the apparatus and squeezing her eyes closed.   
There was a pop and fizzle. Then silence. She cracked one eye open and peeked out. The apparatus had gone still, the instruments no longer moving.   
“Ianto, it worked!” She gave a relieved laugh and pushed the apparatus out of the way so she could look down at him. He was pale, but definitely only unconscious. Thank God she’d managed to stop that thing before it’d started whatever nasty procedure it’d been about to do. Definitely not any type of regulation-standard brain surgery.   
“You know, this sleeping beauty thing is going to start getting old.” She reached over and unbuckled the thick leather straps around his wrists. They’d bruised and broken his skin. He’d definitely put up a fight before passing out.   
Once he was completely free, she returned her attention to his face. He groaned, starting to come around.   
“That’s it, time to wake up.”   
“Wh—what happened?” He squeezed his eyes closed tighter and brought a hand up to rub over his face.   
“I was hoping you could tell me. Was there someone else in here with you?”  
He blinked open his eyes, taking a moment to focus. “There was… It was… Christ, my head is killing me.”  
“It could have been worse, believe me. I just barely stopped this thing from cracking your skull like a watermelon.”  
He made a face at her. “Charming imagery.”  
She helped him sit up, and he glanced at the now defunct apparatus, shuddering. “It looks like the upgrade unit the Cybermen used. Do you think they were going to do something like that to me?”  
“Luckily, we won’t ever find out. And hopefully we’ve left a big enough path of destruction through this temple that they won’t bother trying to pick up the pieces.” She took his arm and let him lean on her as he gingerly climbed down from the table like his whole body was aching.   
“What about the Timeless? We still don’t know what they’re up to.”   
“That’s not your problem, Mr. Jones. Your part in this is over. It’s time I took you home.”  
“To Jack.”   
That seemed to cheer him right up, his bleary eyes clearing.   
“To Jack,” she confirmed, enjoying the smile that spread over his face. Like an actual sunrise. Some days, she could swear it was love, pure and simple, that kept the universe ticking over.   
She kept hold of his arm as they left the silver chamber, since he still seemed a little unsteady. Neither of them said anything the entire walk back to the TARDIS.  
“So you’re going to go after them, the Timeless?” he asked once they were inside and she’d sat him down on the seat while she fired up the engines.   
“I don’t have a choice. If they’re really out there, I can’t turn a blind eye. I’m probably the only person who has the slightest chance of stopping them. And even those odds are miniscule, if I’m being completely honest. Last time it took an entire army of Timelords and advance weaponry to stop the Timeless. I’m one Timelord with a sonic screwdriver and a temperamental TARDIS.” She sent him a smile over her shoulder, catching his worried expression. “But when has that ever stopped me?”  
“It’s just that—” He stared down at his hands, brow furrowed like he was trying to sort out his thoughts. “I don’t know what it is. There’s this heavy feeling in my stomach. Like we missed something. Like there’s something else. You said someone else was in that room with me?”  
“That’s what they told me.” She turned to face him, leaning against the console behind her. “But there was a flash just before I got into the room. Some kind of transport beam I’m guessing. Whoever it was, they weren’t interested in waiting around to face me.”  
She went over and sat next to him. “There’s no use you worrying about it, Ianto. And I’m truly sorry you got dragged into it. But you should know, that temple, it was set up specifically to trap us; you, me or Jack. I have no idea why, but I intend to find out quickly.”  
“But if that’s the case, won’t Jack and I be in danger? What if they come for us?”  
“I can’t guarantee they won’t.” She took his hand and squeezed it reassuringly. “But the fact is, they’ve left you alone while you’ve been on Earth. This was set up to lure you out, I’m only sorry I was foolish enough to fall for it.”  
He shook his head, understanding in his blue eyes. “You couldn’t have known. Anyone could have made that mistake.”  
Yes, anyone could have, but with all her thousands of years in age and experience, The Doctor should never have made such an error.   
“Anyway, I think you and Jack will be safe enough on Earth while I track down some answers. The universe knows that Earth is protected, and any threats that have arrived on your doorstep have been dealt with swiftly and decisively. The Timeless aren’t imprudent or impatient. They know it would be harder to get to you on Earth, which was why they had to lure you out.”  
“Got it. Stay on Earth, stay safe.”  
“That’s all you have to do, Mr. Jones.”  
He smiled at her, but she could see concern in his gaze. “You will be careful, though, won’t you? Maybe find someone else to watch your back? This doesn’t seem like the kind of thing a person should be taking on by themselves.”  
“Don’t you worry, I’ll take care of this, with or without a companion.” She jumped up and returned to the control console. “Now, it’s about time we went back to Earth to see what Captain Jack Harkness is up to. One can only imagine what kind of trouble he’s getting himself into.”  
“If you don’t mind, I’m going to change back into my own clothes.” He was already heading off, even as he said the words.   
“Go ahead, take your time.” She waved a hand at him, keeping her attention on the console screen checking readouts. “Actually, not too much time. We’ll be back on Earth in just a few minutes.”  
Information scrolled across her screen, the years of Earth with major events listed, skipping by as she searched for a point in time close to where they’d left. But as she read over them, patterns started emerging, specifically that nothing much had changed in the years following the day Ianto should have died, when the fact that she’d saved him should have created some distinctly new sequences.   
“That doesn’t make sense,” she muttered. Unless— “Unless he’s not meant to go back. Unless he’s meant to stay dead.”   
Oh no. Ianto was not going to be happy about this. She searched the intervening years, taking a few moments to work it out, but she managed to pinpoint where Ianto needed to slot back into Jack’s timeline, and it definitely wasn’t where she’d taken him from.   
The events in the years following Ianto’s supposed death now looked completely different with her knowledge that The Timeless was out there. Perhaps they hadn’t been leaving Earth alone liked she’d assumed. Perhaps they’d been playing a much longer, more subtle game. And when she found the event the people of Earth had dubbed Miracle Day, it was like a neon sign that she’d somehow overlooked before. The answer of the Timeless had been like a keystone, locking together pieces that previously hadn’t fit.   
She blew out a long breath and stepped back from the console, no idea where she was supposed to start with this. The Timeless had a head start on her thousands of years long. Who knew how far and deep their seeds were sown?  
There was only one certainty right at this moment. She would not be returning Ianto to 2009.


	10. Chapter 10

Ianto smoothed his hands down the fresh suit he’d found in amongst the endless racks of The Doctor’s clothes. It was a nice suit; navy blue with lighter pinstripes. He’d found a light blue shirt and dark maroon tie to go with it, and had to say, he was very happy with the result. Felt much more like himself. He didn’t think the Doctor would mind him borrowing the outfit, but maybe he should have asked first, just to be polite.

When he’d picked up the clothes he’d been wearing earlier today, a strange kind of repulsion had flowed through him. He’d died in those clothes, and he couldn’t bring himself to put them back on, not when he was going to see Jack and get his second chance. Or was it a third chance? Actually, it was probably more like four or five chances by now. For both of them. But that was the mystery and magnetism of what kept drawing them back together. Perhaps it was naive or cliché to say, but it just felt like they were meant to be. No matter what happened, in spite of and because of death, they always found a way.

A sharp pain spike through his head for a split second, leaving him blinking. There’d been a dull ache in his forehead since he’d woken up on that table, but that momentary pain had been intense. He shook his head to dispel the last of it. After all he’d been through in the last day, he was probably lucky a slightly aching head was the worst of his troubles.

And he was thanking his lucky stars that The Doctor had managed to stop that apparatus before it’d managed to do whatever it was designed to do to his skull. Obviously the first part of the procedure had involved rendering him unconscious and scrambling his memory, because everything from when he’d been in that room was just a blur in his mind. There had been someone else in there with him. The only reason he knew was from a strong sense of residual anger. Like whoever it was had really pissed him off before knocking him out.

None of it really mattered now, though. The Doctor would eventually catch up with whoever it was after she’d dropped him back on Earth with Jack and Gwen. And maybe, if they were really lucky, she’d stick around long enough to help them sort out the problem of those 456 aliens who wanted to take ten percent of the world’s children.

He returned to the control room just as the TARDIS made a whooshing-wheezing noise and then powered down.

“I hope you don’t mind,” he called as he stepped out. “I took the liberty of borrowing some clothes.”

She turned with a smile, but it seemed a little forced. “No, I don’t mind at all. Looking very sharp.”

“Thank you.” He joined her next to the console. “Have we arrived then?”

She crossed her arms, staring up at him, a definite hint of apprehension edging into her expression. “We’ve arrived on Earth, yes. But there are some things we need to talk about first.”

Why didn’t he like the sound of that?

“What things?”

“Things like how time is tricky.” She was clearly hedging. He definitely didn’t like it.

“Right, but you told me it was simple, that you could take me back to five minutes after we left. In 2009.” His voice had gotten tight and he swallowed, trying not to jump to all the worst conclusions about where this was heading.

“I did, but if we’re being honest, I would have said almost anything to get you to come with me.”

“What are you trying to tell me?”

She straightened, shifting to stand directly in front of him. “You were meant to die that day, Ianto. You did die.”

“No, I didn’t. You saved me and I’m standing right here. So, what’s the problem?” His pulse had picked up speed, a low swell of panic rising. Had something happened to Jack? To Earth? Was there nothing to go back to?

“The problem is, before I couldn’t see it. I didn’t know the Timeless were involved, out there hiding in the far reaches beyond the edges of the universe, biding their time. But now I can see it. I can see their hand in so many things.”

“What has this got to do with me dying?”

“Your death happened. An entire timeline unfolded without you in it. Jack kept going, just like you knew he would, but he never forgot you. Not until his last breath.”

“So he does eventually die then?” The thought of something he’d come to believe was so impossible sent a physical wave of pain through him, making his breath catch.

The Doctor held up a finger. “Shh. Forget I said that. Spoilers.”

“Spoilers? What does that mean?”

“It’s a thing. Never mind. What I’m trying to tell you, Ianto, is that by saving you that day, I altered things. But when I checked just now to bring you back, nothing had changed.”

He shook his head. “Now you’ve lost me. Time travel is the one thing I’ve managed to avoid at Torchwood.”

She grabbed the console screen and brought up a quick diagram with some lines on it to demonstrate. “By saving you and then returning you a few minutes later, you should have gone on to impact the timeline, albeit in small ways, in the years following. But there’s not the smallest deviation to suggest that happened. Not until a few years later.”

“Which means…?”

“You’re not supposed to return to 2009. You need to stay dead. But I’m fairly sure I’ve found where I need to slot you back into Jack’s timeline. However, I have to warn you, he won’t be the same man you left that day the 456 aliens killed you.”

“How many years?” he asked through a tight jaw. His heart was pounding, disbelief surging through him.

“Around nine.”

“ _Nine years_?” He snatched in a sharp breath. “You want to take me back nine years after the 456 killed me?”

“Ianto, we’re already here. In Cardiff 2018. This is where and when you meet Jack again. The new Cardiff.”

“New Cardiff? What does that mean?” he said distractedly, mind reeling.

“Well, there was an incident with some aliens called the Sorvix. A lot has happened in the last nine years.”

He gave an almost hysterical laugh. “You think?”

“Well, yes, that was probably an understatement of sorts.”

He dragged both his hands over his face. “Oh God. I can’t believe this is happening. You said you could take me right back. What the hell am I supposed to do now? Just walk in and say _hi Jack, sorry you thought I was dead for the past nine years, but I just popped off half a century into the future with The Doctor for a bit of shenanigans. Who, by the way, is now a woman_. That’s going to go down smashing.”

She caught his shoulders. “Sass, Ianto. You’re spiralling.”

“Sorry, I’m sorry.” He gulped in a long breath, trying to calm his racing thoughts.

“I should be the one saying sorry. Before I knew what we were dealing with, I thought this was going to be simple. But it’s not, it’s really not. It’s so far from simple, I barely know where to begin.”

He exhaled, forcing the last of the shock away. This wasn’t The Doctor’s doing. It was them, the Timeless. And if The Doctor was going to find a way to beat them, then she needed all the help she could get. She needed Captain Jack Harkness.

“We could begin by stepping out those doors and seeing what we find in 2018 Cardiff.”

He held out his arm for her, and she folded her hand into the crook of his elbow with a relieved smile.

“Brilliant idea, Mr Jones.”

They proceeded along the walkway, his heart picking up speed with each step closer to the TARDIS doors. Somewhere out there was Jack. And apparently, they had nine years’ worth of catching up to do. A smile spread over his lips. He could only begin to imagine what that would entail.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of episode 1. The first chapter of ep 2 should be coming later this week.  
> Always, But Not Forever - Ianto Jones died a day ago in 2009. Except he kind of didn't. Saved by The doctor, he's been five hundred years in the future and now returned to Cardiff 2018. Nine years have passed, Torchwood has persisted, but Jack and Gwen have moved on. Can Ianto step back into his old life, or will he find there's no longer a place for him?


End file.
